In current years, the Amazon Kindle has solely seen minor updates, getting advances like sharper E Ink screens and a welcome change to USB-C charging ports, however immediately Amazon introduced a significant improve within the new Kindle Scribe, which turns the e-reader into an e-note system with an included stylus that by no means wants charging.

Although Sony beat the corporate to the punch, Amazon’s Kindle was arguably the E Ink system that lastly popularized ebooks and e-readers with customers. And though many predicted the dying of E Ink units when the iPad arrived, they’ve as an alternative thrived, thanks partly to the arrival of extra succesful e-note units just like the reMarkable pill, which leveraged digital paper expertise to create digital notepads.

Bigger Is Better

As with units just like the reMarkable 2 or the Boox tablets from Onyx, the brand new Kindle Scribe is way bigger than Amazon’s different e-readers. It’s constructed round a ten.2-inch, 300 PPI, glare-free E Ink display screen that features a entrance gentle that routinely adjusts the display screen brightness to account for a room’s ambient lighting, which may be shifted to hotter tones for while you wish to learn or work late at night time with much less danger of affecting your sleep.

Like the Kindle Oasis e-reader, the brand new Kindle Scribe options an asymmetrical design with a thicker bezel on one facet, making the e-note simpler to carry in a single hand whereas utilizing the stylus within the different. It additionally measures in at simply 5.8-millimeters thick, which is definitely a bit thinner than the Kindle Paperwhite e-reader, but additionally a bit thicker than the reMarkable 2, as reMarkable doesn’t embrace display screen lighting on its E Ink tablets but.

Two Stylus Options

The Kindle Scribe will likely be offered with two completely different stylus choices. The least expensive model of the e-note will embrace the Basic pen, which in contrast to the Apple Pencil, by no means must be charged. Still, you possibly can magnetically connect it to the facet of the Scribe for storage.

A pricier model of the Kindle Scribe will as an alternative embrace a Premium pen that gives the identical battery-free performance because the Basic choice, however provides a devoted eraser instrument on the tip, in addition to a shortcut button close to the tip that may be personalized to rapidly change the pen to eraser or highlighter modes, or open a brand new sticky be aware when pressed.

Like different e-notes, the Kindle Scribe permits eBooks and PDFs to be annotated straight on the web page textual content, but additionally makes use of digital sticky notes tagged to particular components of a doc. These notes get routinely organized and may be rapidly accessed outdoors of a doc as wanted. The e-note additionally serves as a digital notepad, coming with a wide range of templates together with to-do lists, lined paper, or clean pages for sketches.

Where the Kindle Scribe is perhaps missing, no less than at launch, is getting hand-written notes or sketches onto different units. Ask any reMarkable consumer what their favourite function is and so they’ll in all probability level to its flawless cloud syncing and cell and desktop apps that permit paperwork to be simply uploaded and downloaded. With the Kindle Scribe, whereas all notebooks are “automatically saved and backed up to the cloud for free,” customers should wait till subsequent 12 months to have the ability to entry them by means of the varied variations of the Kindle app.

Amazon didn’t share particular particulars on the Kindle Scribe’s battery life, apart from promising “weeks and weeks of battery life” that might doubtlessly last as long as a full month relying on its use. But we do know that, like the corporate’s different e-readers, the Scribe can have full entry to the Kindle Store for buying ebooks proper on the system, and can embrace a four-month subscription to Kindle Unlimited.

Pricing and Availability

Like the Oasis, the Scribe will likely be a premium Kindle providing, and begins at $340 for the 16GB mannequin that features the Basic pen choice, and can arrive in time for the vacations. Pricing goes up from there for many who go for the Premium pen, or need the Scribe with extra storage, as 32GB and 64GB choices may even be out there.

Amazon can be releasing a group of leather-based and cloth covers in varied colours for the Kindle Scribe, with a folding lid that may double as a stand and help the e-note at completely different angles for studying and writing, though pricing particulars for them haven’t been revealed but.